To conform within rational limits to a given style is no more servile than to pay one's taxes or to write according to the rule of grammar.

I am going to make everything around me beautiful - that will be my life.

Be pretty if you can, be witty if you must, but be gracious if it kills you.

I believe in optimism & plenty of white paint.

It is the personality of the mistress that the home expresses. Men are forever guests in our homes, no matter how much happiness they may find there.

The cardinal virtue of all beauty is restraint.

You will express yourself in your house whether you want to or not.

I was born with the courage to live. Only those are unwise who have never dared to be fools.

What is the goal? A house that is like the life that goes with it, a house that gives us beauty as we understand it- and beauty of a nobler kind that we may grow to understand.

Light, air and comfort - these three things I must always have in a room.

[At first sight of the Acropolis:] It's beige! My color!

Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart. Who looks outside, wishes. Who looks inside, finds infinite wisdom.

poets. have the toughest jobin the universe-of turning silenceinto eloquence.

Atheism is not a matter of the mind; it is a matter of the heart.

The bell strikes one. We take no note of time But from its loss.

The only time I ever met a character that I wrote was when I met Ian McKellan, when he was playing Magneto in the 'X-Men' movies.

I know something about performing. I know that when it seems like the avalanche is about to roll over you, you face into it and keep both arms swimming as hard as you can. You smile and you sell it.

An ill winde that bloweth no man to good.

I'd rather see you poor men's wives, if you were happy, beloved, contented, than queen's on thrones, without self-respect and peace.

There is something incredibly arousing about being wanted. I pulled my hand back and sucked in a deep breath. “Adam,” I said.

Besides the general infusion of wit to heighten civility, the direct splendor of intellectual power is ever welcome in fine society, as the costliest addition to its rule and its credit.